


Broken Smiles, Shattered Minds

by Katzencreme



Category: Marble Hornets
Genre: Alex has an attitude, Brian is in trouble and deserves better, Gen, Horror, Mental Health Issues, Platonic Relationships, Slenderverse, They might get mad, creepy buildings, don't sacrifice your friends to Eldritch monstrosities, subtle Brim
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:41:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26665342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katzencreme/pseuds/Katzencreme
Summary: Major Spoiler Warning!!!!(Featuring Pre-Hoodie Brian because we can all use more Brian in our lives))What would entry 51 look like from Brian’s point of view? What did he experience when Alex led him to the Operator and left him for dead? What did the Operator do with him that kickstarted his transformation into the hooded figure? Plus a bunch of personal headcanons surrounding Brian and an in depth exploration of his friendship and mentality towards the rest of the Marble Hornets crew. He’s the star of this fanfic ;)
Relationships: Alex Kralie/Brian Thomas, Brian Thomas/Timothy "Tim" Wright
Kudos: 9





	Broken Smiles, Shattered Minds

**Author's Note:**

> Heya! My name is Katzencreme and welcome to my first fanfiction dedicated to my favorite series! Comments and constructive criticism is greatly appreciated so I know if anyone enjoys it and any points I can improve on. I'm used to writing research essays for college so hopefully my writing style adapts itself. 
> 
> Marble Hornets doesn't belong to me, all rights to the characters and the entry mentioned belong to the creators. :)  
> (Anyone else here watch Tim's Metal Gear Solid streams?)

The parking lot of Rosswood Park was completely deserted as the car pulled in on a chilly autumn afternoon. Brian slowly rubbed his neck as he leaned away from the window he’d been using as a makeshift pillow and gave a cursory glance at his companion in the driver’s seat. Not much of anything had happened during the short drive up to the park, yet the face of Alex Kralie next to him was already set into a permanent scowl, his eyes glaring out the windshield like he was preparing to square off with an arch nemesis right there and then. If Brian hadn’t spent so much time around him during the Marble Hornets filming, he probably would’ve guessed that Alex had indeed brought him along for a brawl, but by now experience with Alex’s frequent mood swings told him that Alex’s personality was like the hand of a broken clock that was frozen forever on its ill-tempered position. Of course, Alex hadn’t always acted that way; Brian still remembered the chill and lighthearted Alex back from when he’d first met him in college. Brian’s own warm and gregarious personality meshed well with Alex’s witty jokes and his solid adherence to the mantra of living in the moment, not to mention their mutual interest in film and the sheer artistry with which Alex gave his spontaneous trumpet performances during late night dorm room hangouts. Brian turned his head to the left a bit and smiled at the mental image that memory conjured up so Alex wouldn’t take notice and start asking what was so funny. Those days seemed almost distant now, which was also funny in its own way, considering that their college days were far from over. But it seemed to Brian that people like any other force of nature are subject to change when one least expects it, because something had flipped a switch in Alex’s brain part way through filming that admittedly cheesy student film of his (not that Brian would ever admit that to him) that’d made him jumpy, on edge, and unable to fully relax and goof around with the crew like he once had, as if something was always out to get him at every turn. Even now he could read it on his face-Alex’s eyes were scanning the tree line as if someone - or something - was lurking there. Brian could only not for the life of him figure out the reason why.

Alex’s gaze slowly slid away from the windshield and the trees as he rose to leave the car, slamming the car door shut with enough force behind him to send fallen leaves scattering in all directions. “Are you going to sit there all day or are we going to get our footage and leave?” came Alex’s muffled voice as he stomped over to the trunk to begin unloading their equipment. Brian sighed, the memories receding as he moved to assist Alex before he started ranting about his film constantly being delayed by incompetent actors. He supposed it wouldn’t do any good to continue dwelling on the past, this was present Alex now and Brian wasn’t one to hold grudges-they were still friends after all, even if things had changed. Not everyone felt the same way-Tim frequently complained about Alex’s outbursts when he and Brian were sitting down for a meal or playing intensive rounds of Mario Kart on Brian’s Wii after Brian insisted that he was unbeatable at virtual sports. Brian refrained from pointing out that whenever Tim and Alex got into an argument, a significant amount of colorful words and poorly disguised sarcasm was wielded by both sides, but he saw where his best friend was coming from and knew he couldn’t let Alex off the hook so easily. Plus, he did feel bad that Tim had to deal with Alex’s constant nitpicking when it was Brian who’d introduced Tim to Alex in the first place as a mutual friend and convinced him to join the cast. He was certainly not going to let anyone, Alex included, push around or interfere with his best friend’s well being, and he made it a point to remind Alex when he’d gone too far, which usually worked, unless Alex was in an especially bad mood. As irritable as Alex was, he was still susceptible to a friend’s input once in a while, and Brian and him had been particularly close, enough for him to lend at least some thought to Brian’s criticism, albeit grudgingly. Close enough even for Brian to still get away with knocking on Alex’s apartment door unannounced with a wide assortment of snacks and Charades every so often while declaring that it was “emergency friend rejuvenation time”, without being immediately kicked out by a scowling Alex in the doorway. Brian would simply point to the Charades box and say it was excellent practice for top tier acting in a student film, and Alex would sigh and agree to a few rounds of competition, even smiling sometimes at their most amusing attempts, which was all Brian was hoping for. 

As he walked to the back of the car, Alex was impatiently waiting there with several bags clutched in his hands, which he promptly transferred over to Brian, grumbling to himself about crew members who refused to do the heavy lifting, while Brian merely slung them over his shoulders without complaint. Alex was reaching for the camera, fully intending to carry it himself, when Brian intercepted him and snatched it, holding it in his hands like a prize. Alex narrowed his eyes and was about to say something about being the director and therefore automatically in charge of the most important equipment, but Brian merely flashed him his trademark radiant grin. “But I’m the star, so that means I get dibs on the camera that will be filming this”…he paused and ran his hand dramatically through his hair for extra effect…”world class look.” Alex merely scoffed and made no moves to take the camera back, turning on his heel without a backward glance and setting out for Rosswood’s trail entrance. Brian grinned in triumph and trotted after him, equipment swinging back and forth against his jacket. It seemed that even Alex’s bad moods weren’t immune to charm. There was no way Brian was going to let him stew in his sour indignation forever, whether he wanted to or not, which he considered as part of his duties as friend. They passed Rosswood’s battered entrance sign and moved onto the trails, where the sounds of the world fell away to be replaced by a silence broken only by the crunch of the gravel and Alex’s ever forceful footsteps on the hard ground. As they moved deeper into the woods, Alex seemed to relax a bit and his steps became lighter and smoother, the tension melting off his stance and straightening his posture. The hard look in his eyes was replaced by something akin to satisfaction, although Brian still couldn’t discern the reason for the change. It was all right though, because Brian was delighted that Alex had loosened up a little and would hopefully act less like nobody else was there with him, hauling all of their stuff and trying desperately to raise his friend out of his forlorn mood. All of Brian’s attempts at conversation and his occasional jests at Alex for always wearing the same striped jacket had only been met with stony silence or an exasperated huff from the receiving end, who continued to trek through the woods unabated. Brian didn’t even know exactly where Alex was taking him-Alex had simply called him the previous day and said that he’d found a few good locations for some scenes with Brian’s character, and that if Brian was free tomorrow he should drive down with him and make himself useful. When Brian asked where these places were, Alex had simply replied with “Around. You’ll see when you get there anyway,” and hung up. Brian decided it was better just to humor him and let Alex lead him to wherever it was that he’d found. It wasn’t like he had anything planned for today anyway, and besides, he liked exploring and considered it as an adventure to not always know the full plan. 

He was still a bit curious however, and decided to take his chances with a direct question, if only to provoke a response. “How much farther away is it? I hope the next up and coming film director hasn’t gotten himself lost on his own set?” Alex rolled his eyes hard and whirled around to face Brian. “I know perfectly well where I’m going, and if you must have the patience level of a small child, we’re nearly at our first stop. Now please stop talking so the director can concentrate.” Brian grinned again and shrugged his shoulders in a placating gesture, raising a finger to his lips in a mock imitation of silence, which seemed to satisfy Alex, who swiveled back around to resume leading their two person party. Sure enough, a few minutes of walking later brought them to a point where the trees began to thin out until they disappeared altogether, revealing a swatch of flat land that was cut across by a set of railroad tracks that wound their way into the distance. A tall hedge ran along one end, likely placed there to reduce noise for the pedestrians using the park trails. “We're here,” announced Alex with a pointed glare in Brian’s direction, before turning to him and gesturing impatiently to the camera. Brian shrugged off the strap and passed the camera over to him while Alex squinted at Brian’s hands to assure himself that Brian wouldn’t snatch it away again, after which he proceeded to mess around with it. Brian put on his best innocent face and idled towards the tracks to wait for some sort of instructions, awkwardly tapping a foot against the track siding and kicking at the loose pebbles scattered onto the grass. Alex finished his adjustments and raised the camera, pointing it at the tracks for a close up shot of the metal ties. “Are you recording now?” asked Brian with a bit of confusion, noticing the movement and wanting to make sure that he wasn’t supposed to be doing something right then. The last thing he wanted was for Alex to start lecturing him about not paying attention. “Yeah I’m just getting some B-roll” came Alex’s response, surprisingly calm and without a trace of his previous hostility. It seemed his bad mood had vanished in the midst of his work, which wasn’t unwelcome. Brian nodded in confirmation and stopped to shift the remaining bags on his shoulders to the ground for a break, enjoying the calm weather and the rustling of the trees surrounding them. 

It was then that he remembered something that’d been bothering him ever since they’d first gotten in the car, so he decided to take advantage of Alex’s improved mood and satisfy his curiosity. “Where’s Seth at?” he questioned. Seth had always been the designated camera guy, and although Alex also knew his way around a camera, it was Seth who did the actual filming the most, leaving Alex free to advise the actors on the details of the scene and focus on the big picture. But Seth wasn’t along this time, and Alex had taken on that role himself, which was rare and frankly a bit odd that he hadn’t mentioned him or asked him to tag along. There was a pause, and then Alex answered, “Uh, we came out here yesterday and he wasn’t feeling too good so he just stayed home today.” “Oh that sucks,” replied Brian, slightly surprised, reminding himself to call Seth later to check up on him, although he‘d seemed perfectly fine a few days ago. Then again, he’d thought Alex was fine up until his mood turned dramatically sour out of the blue, so it wouldn’t surprise him if his powers of observation regarding Seth had faded a bit. Alex cleared his throat and fidgeted a bit, before raising the camera back up and facing Brian directly. “Alright, what I’m going to do for this is, I’m just going to set up right here so you can’t see my shadow, and we’ll have you walk along the frame, starting where you are.” Brian nodded, excited at finally having something to do and took his position while Alex prepared. “Alright we ready?” he asked after Alex had finished. “Yeah just walk along here, if you want to walk on the rail that’s fine, just…reflective, and just keep on going, I’ll tell you when you’re out of the frame again.” “Okay, cool cool,” replied Brian as he stepped onto the rail, took a deep breath, and slowly walked along it, trying his absolute best to look meditative and absorbed in the deep memories of his childhood. He seemed to be acting that particular kind of scene out an awful lot in this production, and he could bet that Tim shared similar thoughts; he could joke about it with him later that evening when Alex was busy elsewhere. A thought came to him suddenly that he had no idea if he was supposed to be silent here or not, and the camera was already rolling. “Are we allowed to talk now or should I be silent?” inquired Brian, partly to mess with Alex’s iron attentiveness to the camera screen. “Yeah I’m just going to put music over it,” came Alex’s voice from behind him, unbothered. “Oh okay,” he replied, pleasantly surprised, and continued to meander along the tracks. After a short period, Alex decided that he had what he needed. “Alright that’s good, come on back,” he called to Brian. “Alright,” called Brian back, who rejoined Alex to film a few quick closeups of his face to use as filler, although Brian had to concentrate to keep from laughing at his own very serious gazing at the empty ground. An effort he considered worthy of a star actor. 

“Well, that should do it for this scene,” Alex concluded while dismantling and re-packing his film set-up. “It’s only another short walk through the woods to reach the next location, which should also be our last one since it’s the most important.” “Sweet, sounds good,” agreed Brian, re-gathering the discarded bags that he’d set down earlier. According to Alex’s directions, the next location was in another area of Rosswood disconnected from the main trails, so they had to follow the edge of a cornfield and re-enter the woods on the other side, the rays of the setting sun casting a glow over their faces. Alex was aiming the camera at Brian’s face as they walked, after all, this was one of the last looks he’d likely ever see of his friend after they reached the building and he…Alex’s thoughts were interrupted as Brian noticed that he was being recorded, laughed aloud, and in his most ruminative, in-character voice said “I’m just going to stare off in the distance like I don’t care.” Something deep inside Alex faltered after seeing Brian smile like that, acting with his achingly familiar air of untroubledness and joviality as he would around good friends, as if everything was perfectly fine. But Alex knew nothing was really fine, and although he would hate to do it, it was pointless to doubt himself now that he was getting closer to finally stopping “It" and…-Alex shook himself out of his moral debate. That time hadn’t yet come, so he might as well enjoy Brian’s company while he could almost trick himself into believing that nothing menacing existed in those woods at all.

Brian noticed Alex had gone quiet all of a sudden and decided to give him some space, instead focusing on the nature that had re-enveloped them on all sides after they’d entered back into the cover of Rosswood and its winding back trails. Brian had always considered himself an outdoors person; he’d lived an active lifestyle since childhood and found a lot of enjoyment in hiking, canoeing and biking the rivers, forests and mountains that Alabama had to offer, alongside his school sports of football and ultimate frisbee. The whole film crew would come to cheer him on during his home games, Alex teasingly throwing popcorn at Jay in the stands, Jay throwing his arms around in a useless attempt to dodge, and Tim giving him a shy wave when Brian’s eyes spotted them from the field. The crew still came nowadays, except Alex’s spot was usually empty, Alex claiming he had too much editing to catch up on, though it worried Brian how his eyes slid sideways when he said so. He didn’t hold it against him of course, but he did miss Alex’s presence amidst his friends. The woods here were an alternative to social sports, a kind of natural sanctuary where he could go to unwind for a while, away from other pairs of eyes, while staying active simultaneously. He was a social person at heart, though even he needed a break to himself once in a while to attend to his own emotions. He quickly found out that Tim had a quite opposing opinion on the meditative qualities of the woods; whenever he could actually convince Tim to explore the woods with him, Tim chatted with Brian the whole way, yet seemed tense and alert rather than anywhere near calm, jumping at sudden noises and casting nervous glances into the trees every so often, his eyes becoming distant and uneasy, although Brian never noticed anything out of place. At those times, Brian let Tim use him as a source of comfort, Tim clutching his hoodie with one hand until that distant look vanished and they were talking comfortably again. Brian always made sure to show Tim that he was there and willing to look out for his best friend, no matter if Tim shared his reasons or not. 

But whatever calm and familiarity Brian had found within the forest for years vanished instantaneously as the first glimpse of their new destination materialized into view. It was a building, Brian could tell it was abandoned by the overgrown walkway, and hidden behind dense greenery. The front doors stood wide open, revealing the murky darkness of the interior and empty hallways leading to unknown rooms. The patterned wall panels that had once lent some decoration to an otherwise plain brick building were crumbling and slowly being overtaken by the forces of nature surrounding it. Brian stared at what would become their next film set and suddenly felt very nauseous, although he was sure that he wasn’t sick nor had been for a while. Just looking at the building left an unexplained hollow feeling in his stomach that twisted itself into small knots, causing him to groan quietly and take a moment to clutch his midsection in an attempt to soothe the pain. However, the feeling was gone as fast as it’d come, and Brian concluded that it’d just been a random stomach cramp and rushed to catch up to Alex, who didn’t seem to have noticed anything or experienced a similar discomfort. They were approaching the entrance now and Alex was documenting the path ahead. “So what is this place?” inquired Brian, casting an uneasy glance at the cracked flooring that lent further testimony to just how long this place had been devoid of living things. “Uh…,”came Alex’s reply, who was trying his best to appear nonchalant, “I think it was like an old doctor’s office or something. When Seth and I were out here yesterday, we found it and it looked cool, so I figured we could come here and get some shots.” Brian merely raised an eyebrow and said the first words that he would use to describe such a “cool” area. “It’s kind of creepy,” he remarked, casting the sort of glance at Alex that had “what have you got me into” written all over it. Alex was silent for a few moments before replying. “Yeah. It’s got the whole burning out building look to it.”

Now even though Brian found the place exceptionally creepy, he was still Alex’s friend and was willing to brave the foreboding atmosphere if what they accomplished there would indeed benefit Alex’s film. If Alex as the director found something about the place that he felt fit well with Marble Hornets, then Brian couldn’t fully argue against it. He’d signed up for it and felt obligated to follow Alex’s artistic vision. However, the situation still made him uneasy. Why would Alex choose such an isolated and decrepit building for a story about love, change and relieving the memories of childhood? An old doctor’s office seemed out of place compared to past settings. “So, like, what are we going to be shooting in this part?” Brian asked, genuinely curious as to what’d prompted a technical choice like this. “Uh, I figured I would just get some B-roll. We can just say that it was like Brian’s old elementary school or something like that that burned down, so that will reflect the spot,” replied Alex, gesturing with a hand around the corridor they were now moving down. “Okay,” confirmed Brian, but seeing the inner building’s poor condition gave him the feeling that they were trespassing on private property. “Um, are you sure we’re not going to get in trouble for like being here?” he questioned, looking around for any signs forbidding entry. There was an unmistakably strange feeling in the air, almost as if the building itself didn’t want them to be there: a place reserved for outside forces, which was silly, but also somehow believable. “Yeah, I mean like, it’s a burned out building. Who cares?” stated Alex simply, letting out a small cough. No no it can’t be here already-it’s too soon-he’ll notice-not part of the plan, came Alex’s panicked thoughts. But what he feared didn’t appear and he breathed a sigh of relief. Brian hadn’t noticed Alex’s expression and merely turned to him warningly. “I think we might need to leave after we get the shot done, dude.” Brian may have been willing to tolerate the “creepy abandoned building” part, but he was definitely not willing to break the law for simple B-roll. “We’ll make it quick,” assured Alex. But only one of us is going to be leaving this place. Your smile trusts me blindly and I’m sorry. 

Brian supposed that Alex had a point and shrugged in confirmation, but still wasn’t fully convinced. As they progressed deeper into the building, Brian took notice of the way the wallpaper was peeling off of the plaster in jagged cracks and the way the interior appeared charred in places, as if a great fire had broken out. He took a moment to cough into his arm, more forcefully than he would’ve expected, most likely from all the dust hanging around here, he inwardly complained. If this place had indeed been a doctor’s office at one point, something terrible had happened here that left a lingering sense of danger, which only strengthened Brian’s intuition that they shouldn’t stay there any longer than necessary. He could probably convince Alex to return outside faster if it seemed like he was having a little too much fun scouting around. Alex led him down the hallways, stopping now and again to film shots of Brian roaming the halls or staring at the walls or the forest outside. I’m definitely getting exercise out of this with all the walking Alex is making me do in this film, thought Brian to himself, amused. Once Alex had him help set up the tripod only to silently judge him as Brian struggled with it for several minutes, cracking a smile in spite of himself at the sight of Alex’s growing exasperation. If Alex was truly bad at one thing, it was hiding his emotions from other people, which had a tendency to set off anyone who had reason to quarrel with him, though Brian tended to avoid conflict. Brian noted to himself with interest how much things changed when talking to Alex versus Tim, for example, with Alex tending to be controlled by his emotions and Tim actively hiding them from anyone and anything, requiring Brian to gently coax them out of him if it seemed something was bothering him and he wanted to help. His friends were different in their own ways, which Brian decided he liked very much, even if Alex didn’t realize it. “Are you finally done messing around with that?” Alex huffed. “You’re certainly not helping us leave any faster.”

They finally came to another long corridor, where Alex pointed him towards a door frame and instructed him to lean against it and focus on the ground, balancing his camera so it pointed down to the far end, where a portion of the forest was visible. Brian adjusted into his position and waited patiently for what seemed like a longer time than usual. Alex seemed to stall and gaze into his camera with precise slowness unlike the urgency he’d shown previously. Brian was just about to ask him if anything was wrong when a creeping feeling began traveling up his spine, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end like something was lurking just out of sight, dangerous and watchful. He squirmed slightly and tried to relax, but the feeling worsened, worming its way into his chest until he found himself coughing, gasping for breath until he was forced to step to the side, signaling for Alex to pause the take. His throat felt scratchy and constricted, for he couldn’t quite manage to relieve the pressure that ripped through his body with each force of air emerging from his lungs. He was certain he’d never coughed so hard in his life. His backpack lay on the ground nearby, so he shuffled over to it to grab one of the water bottles he carried with him for hikes. Moving with caution, he unscrewed the cap and swallowed a mouthful of water, the cooling liquid providing only miniscule relief to his screaming lungs. It seemed to do the trick though, because his cough began to slow and he found his breath returning under control as he stood there, gasping and recovering from the shock of the unexpected strain. Setting the rest of the water back down, he made his way back over to the wall to re-do the interrupted scene. Alex, who Brian noticed had been expectantly watching him throughout the entire ordeal as if it fascinated him, merely commented a snarky, “Good take,” and resumed recording. Brian gave another small cough and flashed him a “You don’t say” expression, trying to process what’d just gone down. 

Alex resumed his filming like normal, trying to hide the spike in his adrenaline and the sharp curling of his fingers around the camera at the sudden certainty that the moment was near. It was nearby and would be materializing soon to do whatever it did to anyone who was exposed. Alex didn’t care anymore about the details, he didn’t need to understand beyond what was needed, and soon it would be over anyway, another necessary sacrifice to stopping its influence in its tracks. He’d been beginning to fear what he would’ve done if it hadn’t shown up at all; Would he have simply left Brian there and hoped he would be gone the next day? Or would Brian walk away, dazed but unharmed, and leave Alex with a lot of explaining to do that he wasn’t sure he could pull off successfully? Brian was already wary, poised to react to any signs of a disturbance, so this was his only chance to deal with the situation before too many questions were asked. It seemed he was lucky today, for the familiar silhouette of It, that accursed, impossibly tall demon that infected everything in its proximity and made Alex’s life very difficult, appeared at the end of the hallway, its head tilting slightly in curiosity at Brian, who was still turned away and oblivious to the evil standing behind him. Alex tensed slightly yet stared down the entity with a tone of practiced calmness and pure defiance at what he’d come out here to do. I brought another one today. One less person to spread your sickness, one less victim to drag into darkness. Look at me, for I will be your downfall. 

Brian was starting to get bored of standing around doing the same thing. Surely Alex would’ve gotten enough footage by now. He raised his head and was about to remark that they’d better move on to the next scene before the police showed up when he noticed Alex’s expression. His gaze was rooted at something behind him, with a look in his eyes that seemed to sparkle with defiance and finality, oblivious to Brian and everything else. Brian began to turn to see what’d drawn his attention when the camera began to erupt in static. The last thing that Brian saw was Alex standing over him, lips pursed in a look that was almost like, resolve?....pity?... before everything went black.

The light filtered through the open walls and danced brilliantly across Brian’s face as he began to stir from where he lay on the grimy floor. He groaned softly, weakly raising a hand to shield his face while he lay there, dazed and disoriented with a persistent ringing in his ears. His hands reached out and tested the ground before he slowly began to raise himself up, instantly regretting it when a headache exploded behind his eyes, causing him to groan again and cup his face in his hands. When the pain had abated somewhat, he cast a blurry look at his surroundings, recognizing the space as the same hallway where he’d been filming with Alex previously. Only Alex was nowhere to be seen, and he suddenly had the feeling that he really shouldn’t stay here any longer. That creeping feeling was back, warning him that something unexplainable had happened and would happen again if he didn’t leave as quickly as possible. He staggered to his feet, holding onto the wall for balance as he noticed something lying on the ground nearby. Shards of glass crunched under his feet as he walked over to pick up what he recognized as Alex’s video camera, the record button still switched on. That’s odd, why would Alex leave it here? Maybe he was still nearby? “Alex!” he called out. “Alex where are you?” No response. Well, it was worth a try, but it was time to move, before Brian was left to explain himself to any police without backup. He could confront Alex later. Although he could easily walk out into the woods and follow the outside walls back to the entrance, he wanted to at least check the inner building to see if he could run into Alex there and get some clear answers. The layout was unfamiliar to him, so he chose the closest hallway and began making his way further in, calling out now and again for Alex, with the same disappointing result. Just when it seemed like Brian really was alone, he heard it, a cough coming from somewhere nearby; someone was here with him, though their identity was near impossible to discern. He immediately began moving toward the sound, shouting Alex’s name out at the chance it was him in need of help, especially as whoever it was had begun coughing harder to the point of agony, which quickened Brian’s pace. There was something awfully familiar about that coughing though, the sheer harshness of it that was more severe than most people would ever experience, well, that is, everybody except for...“Tim?” he exclaimed in surprise.

The sound had led him to one of the numerous empty rooms off from the main hallway, and the person he found there, huddled in the far corner and coughing like their lungs were about to give out was Tim, wrapped in a blanket and very clearly unwell. Tim didn’t even seem to notice Brian standing there and gave no sign of recognition when Brian called out to him, suddenly angry at Alex for abandoning them both and placing a friend in a position to suffer what looked like significant distress. He was in the middle of shouting for Alex another time to come with help, this time in a considerably more indignant tone, when a sudden loud screeching pierced through the air behind him and caused him to wince, whirling around prepared to tell off whoever it was only to come face to face with a nightmare. There was a figure in the doorway that almost resembled a person, but it wasn’t human. Brian’s widened eyes immediately took notice of its spindly limbs that hung out from its body like rotten tree branches, impossibly long for a human being or anything that Brian could ever associate with a living thing. Tim definitely noticed it too, for he began to cough harder and clutch his jacket closer to his body, eyes fixed on the thing with an indescribable terror. The figure appeared to be wearing black formal attire, except it didn’t behave like regular fabric. Instead, it merged into the inky darkness that dominated its form, utterly lacking any depth of dimension that separated clothing from body. When Brian raised his eyes upwards, his breath hitched in his throat and he began to shake; this thing, this monster, this...whatever it was didn’t have a face, in its place was only a rounded expanse of sickly white and the faintest impressions of where eyes should be, and every inch of it radiated malice. Looking at the thing sparked a massive headache that all at once made Brian ill, as if his body had become a massive weight that was pulling him down towards the ground. His eyes closed for a brief moment then snapped open again as his mind desperately tried to think up an escape for both him and his friend behind him. The thing had moved closer and now loomed so tall above him that Brian shrieked in surprise and horror. The camera that was still in his hands erupted in a series of frenzied garbles as Brian’s vision started to flicker, coughs beginning to erupt from his own throat as the whole room began to distort. He got one last glimpse of reaching shadowy limbs as his vision darkened and he fell once more into nothingness.

This time when Brian awoke, there was no sun to greet him from above, only the rigidness of pavement beneath him and the feeble light of the moon that barely lent illumination to his surroundings. It hurt to move, and for a while he just lay there, staring at the night sky above him as flashbacks from his encounter in the abandoned room replayed in his mind. He couldn’t feel that thing’s presence anymore, that thing had emitted so much negative energy that the lack of it was instantly noticeable. Perhaps the whole ordeal had only been a particularly strong dream. But if that were true, how had he wound up outside? He certainly didn’t remember walking to wherever he now lay. Perhaps he had sleepwalked somehow, a product of wandering those endless corridors for too long? What really worried him though was the way his throat ached, as if he’d spent an entire night coughing, exactly what being in close contact with that thing had felt like. Could it be that all of it had really happened? But that would mean...he pushed himself up off the ground with some difficulty and took stock of his surroundings, suddenly alert. He was in the middle of campus, though it was completely deserted and eerily silent. No signs of life were visible like there usually was when class was in session. No lights shone from the library. No sounds of laughter drifted from an open window. Tim was nowhere in sight, so either he’d never actually been in that decaying room at all or he’d been separated from Brian somehow. Brian desperately hoped it was the latter. There was nothing at all except for the sound of his own breathing. Something felt very off about the whole place, like he was standing on a copy of campus that was missing a few details. Standing alone out here made him nervous, it was too open, too exposed, he needed to get to a secluded spot indoors where it was less likely to be spotted. He didn’t know what he was hiding from exactly, but something in the back of his head told him he needed to. There was a building directly across from him, so he ran over to it in a frantic hope that the building’s doors were unlocked. To his great relief, the doors swung open easily, and he stepped into the lobby. At first he thought that the place was deserted, but in a brief flash of hope he could just barely make out whispers coming from further inside. Quickly running towards what he guessed was their source, he burst into the next open space half expecting to find Alex and the rest of the crew there (who would give him a confused look and say that he and Alex had never gone to any abandoned building), or at least a group of fellow students to prove that everything was okay. Instead he found himself frozen in his tracks. There were other students scattered around the space, but when they turned towards him at the sound of his arrival, not a single one of them had a face, just that familiar sickly white expanse that stared directly at him, unseeing yet seeing everything, exactly like that figure from his dream that was seeming more real by the second. All of them opened their mouths and began to scream, closing in on him from all sides, their arms reaching hungrily outwards, as pulsing waves of static tore through his mind. Brian screamed and bolted back for the entrance, bursting through the doors and…

He’s no longer on campus. He’s standing on carpet and appears to be in a house, breathing heavily and instantly scanning the room for any of those other... things. Finding none, he wonders if something is playing a trick on him, toying with him even. How else can he be in one place and suddenly be in another? As he gets a better look at the room he’s in, he realizes something that confuses him even further. He’s in Tim’s apartment. He recognizes the layout, only thing is all of the lights are out and flipping the switch does nothing. He doesn’t have a flashlight either, so he is forced to investigate in the dark. The first thing he tries is the front door. The lock isn’t engaged so he twists the handle, but the door doesn’t budge an inch. Rattling on it yields the same result, so leaving that way isn’t an option. His next thought is the windows, but as he moves through the first floor, every window has been blacked out. As he looks closer, it’s not that black paint has been brushed over them or that shutters enclose them from the outside, it’s just darkness. A blank void behind which nothing outside of the walls is discernible. The sense of bewilderment at trying to reason out something so illogical moves Brian to do something reckless. He opens a window and stretches his hand outwards, only for it to vanish into the blackness like it was passing through a sheet of smoke. Before he can quite process what has happened, something thin, bony and ice cold clamps around his vanished hand’s wrist, not hard enough to cause pain but enough to lock his fingers in place and send what feels like a creeping numbness through his arm. Brian yells out in alarm and jerks his hand back, the pressure from whatever it was leaving instantly and his hand easily re-emerging from the void. He quickly brings his hand to his face and stares at it hard to glimpse it in the dark, letting out a relieved breath when it appears unscathed. Squinting at it harder though causes his heart to give a panicked jolt. There are faint impressions that resemble fingers about where the hand in the darkness had grabbed him, and the numbness still lingered, a prickling moving through his fingers like touching a static filled television screen. He’s not safe yet and must keep searching for a way out. Something is drawing him in, messing with his senses.

While trying to shake out the tingling in his hand, he searches the rooms of the first level for an object to defend himself with. He doesn’t know what could even hurt that monster he saw, but anything is better than nothing. He’s athletic and can swing anything hard enough to do damage if he needs to, and his eyes come to rest on the fire poker. That will do. He picks it up and holds it in front of him with both hands, ready to swing at the first sign of danger. Brian decides to check the upstairs next and makes his way to the bottom of the stairs. When he turns to face the upstairs landing, he stops abruptly and his brows knit together in more confusion. “Tim?” A figure he knows is Tim because of the sideburns and the familiar tan jacket is facing away from him and staring at the wall, motionless except for the slight rising and falling of his breathing. At the sound of Brian’s voice, he tenses and seems to snap out of a trance, clenching his fists and turning to look back at him. Brian gasps and takes a step back, his back hitting the wall behind him. In the place of Tim’s face is a stark white mask with black markings surrounding the major facial features, giving off an uncanny and vaguely threatening aura. It doesn’t help that it’s so dark that he can’t make out the glint of Tim’s eyes behind the eye holes. It’s just an emotionless void like the dead eyes of a puppet. “Tim! Why are you wearing that? It’s dangerous here, we need to find a way out! I think something is following us, I saw something horrible in that room I found you in, and I don’t know what’s going on but...” he trailed off, noticing Tim had tilted his head to the side slightly and was shifting into what looked like a runner’s stance. “Uh, Tim? Are you alright?” he asked a bit nervously. He’d never seen Tim act like this before, nor had he ever seen a mask like that hanging around Tim’s apartment. Frankly it unnerved him. The way Tim was carrying himself just felt so...off. It didn’t feel like the Tim Brian knew and the Tim in front of him appeared almost hostile, but Brian was his friend, so why would he ever think Tim would hurt him? He had no more time to study this masked Tim closer though because all of a sudden Tim leapt off the landing and hurled down the stairs on all fours directly for Brian, who only dropped his fire poker in shock as Tim barrelled into him and shoved him to the ground. Brian was panicking now and began to struggle as Tim’s fingers wrapped around his throat, cutting off his air supply. “Tim!...what are you doing...stop, it’s me Brian, I’m trying to help you…” Brian gasped out as he struggled to breathe and pry off the vice grip of Tim’s fingers. Tim didn’t respond and only pressed harder, causing Brian to start to feel lightheaded. As he looked up into the white mask, hopeless to fight back, he thought he caught a faint reflection of a tall, dark clothed figure, staring down at him with interest. He gave a strangled gasp and threw his head back in panic and…

He’s in the woods. Tim is gone and he can breathe again, though he can still feel the remnants of where his fingers pressed into his skin. He rubs his hand over his throat, massaging it to relieve some of the soreness. He has no idea what just happened with Tim or why he’d straight up attacked him like that. Another question to add to the rapidly growing pile that he can’t explain, all within the same day too. Great. His heart is still racing a mile a minute and he knows that he still isn’t safe. He needs to keep moving if he has any chance to escape from whatever this is. He swears if that monster he saw reflected in that mask hurt Tim in any way, he’s going to save him and give that thing a piece of his mind in any way he can find. He glances around. There are no trails or signs for Brian to follow that point the way out of the forest, so he chooses a random direction and starts running, threading his way through the trees and underbrush and hoping to reach any sign of civilization, anywhere other than these woods. The trees all at once appear alien and imposing, twisting and contorting their trunks until their limbs are thin, sharp, and tangled amongst each other like a mass of sharp thorns, trying to trap him in their embrace. The air grows colder, piercing through the layers of Brian’s jacket and making him shiver as he begins to sprint, desperately weaving away from the reach of twisted wood, eyes widened in terror and mind racing for an escape route. The trees begin to stretch now, reaching into the sky at impossibly tall heights and bending down towards Brian’s fleeing form, unnatural and endlessly growing. These trees are the complete opposite of the trees that’d offered him freedom and peace of mind. They were a trap waiting to snap shut, evil, menacing and a threat to free will. If those branches reached him, he knew that they’d never let go until he crumbled, exposed to dark forces that infested the human psyche and twisted it until it was unrecognizable, a broken spirit lacking its identity. A low hum of static began to grow in the air, reverberating through Brian’s head and making it hard to think. Almost there, he thought. Just hold on a bit longer. Then you’re free. He noticed a flicker of movement to his right and the static multiplied its intensity until it was so loud that he had to clasp his hands over his ears and grit his teeth to keep his concentration. He was still running at full speed when a tree in front of him shifted, its limbs splitting and bending with a snap until it resembled the outline of a person, only much too tall and enveloped in shadow, the tips of its arms brushing against the ground. The static became deafening and Brian could feel himself coughing, specks of blood appearing on the back of his hand as he fought to ignore the screaming pain in his lungs. He knew what he was looking at and it terrified him that all that running had done nothing to gain distance between him and It. It was only waiting for the right time, letting him think he had the advantage. Brian felt his desperately held hope drain away as his legs weakened and he fell to his knees in the dirt, rooted in place from terror and unable to look away from the unnatural anomaly manifesting in front of him, though every part of him screamed for him to keep running. But he felt so sick. And so tired. The thing titled its head to the side and regarded him intensively, judging this latest creature that’d been drawn into its domain and influence. This one was resilient and persistent, stubbornly holding on to its anonymity and willing to fight against forces much stronger than him. The others like him had put up far less of a struggle. This one would put up resistance to its touch like the first one, an annoyance but ultimately futile in the end. It would have its way in due time, for all of them. Its long arms reached out towards him and Brian felt the contact of a strange substance against his arm when his world went black.

His eyes are closed but he feels warm sunlight. There’s the crinkly texture of dead leaves beneath him and the sounds of nature fill his ears: the gurgling of a nearby river, wind whistling through the trees, animals scampering in the foliage, peaceful. Everything hurts. There’s a persistent aching in his body even when he’s lying still, and his mind feels raw and fuzzy, the remains of a headache still lingering in the corners of his brain. He remembers everything, and wonders to himself if he’s dead, either waking up in the afterlife or even worse, trapped somewhere between life and death at the mercy of that thing. The dread of that thought startles him into opening his eyes, blinking against the light. He mentally braces himself to see that monster towering down on him from above and mocking his short lived peace, but nothing is there. All he sees is the woods, an area he suddenly recognizes as Rosswood. The trees appear as normal as trees in any other forest, any sign of them morphing or turning against him is gone. But he knows how the chase through the previous forest ended, he knows that It got him. It’d been so close and he’d felt it grab him. He should be dead. But he knows deep down that he’s miraculously not. The only possibility is that the thing let him go, though for what reason Brian can’t even fathom. Thinking about it too hard leads to the unsettling feeling that the thing released him for a purpose, a direction that he doesn’t want to go in right now. But yet, that thing didn’t let him go without leaving him changed, he feels different from how he’d been while strolling with Alex through the woods earlier. It’s a sense of perceiving and approaching things that he can’t quite put a finger on. But he does know one thing, all of the day’s events were caused by one person, Alex. Alex Kralie led him to that thing somehow, he knew what would happen and left both him and Tim there to die. The timing made too much sense. The pain of that betrayal fills him with anger that burns hot in his core like lightning. The worst part is, he doesn’t understand why he did it and it hurts. Hadn’t they been the closest of friends, looking out for each other through the bad and the good? Alex had been calm in that building, almost friendly even, like his old self had been. But it was all a trick, Alex had changed far more than he’d initially believed. Brian had been utterly deceived. He can’t forgive Alex for this. He has questions that he intends to find out, questions that will take him outside these woods, and Alex will be giving his share of the answers. I’m coming for you Alex. What have you done?


End file.
